Opportunities offered by ‘creative destruction’
THE Austrian economist, Joseph Schumpeter, spoke of the process of “creative destruction” whereby innovation changes the very nature of industrial markets with huge benefits for the consumer.
Humanity is embarking on a huge transition of creative destruction whereby the fossil fuels and the associated internal combustion engine will become obsolete by universal consent.
However, this transition will be painful as epitomised by the young Brazilian logger on TV recently who, despite his awareness of the perils of deforestation, faced the short-term imperative of providing for his wife and young family.
The rephrasing of “phasing out” to “phasing down” in the draft Cop26 Agreement will have huge consequences for the fate of humanity but it is a pragmatic response to our scarce energy resources dilemma.
Mankind craves material advancement and an oblique halt of fossil fuel use would be catastrophic in a social sense globally while fossil fuel energy companies require funds for the substantial investment in the sustainable alternative energy resources of the future.
Creative destruction of this magnitude offers huge entrepreneurial incentives, particularly for energy firms, but this grey transistional phase of x decades will be a uneasy period of trade-off, compromise and global political and social friction.
Phasing down provides a get-outof-gaol-free card in the short-term for heavy industries facing existential threats but it remains mankind’s only option until the renewable energy innovators witness the fruits of their research and development projects.
Mathematics, science and technology have never been so vital to our future as a species. Ian Roblin Llanishen, Cardiff
Rugby and the Welsh language
I REGRET having to complain, again, about the showing of Wales rugby games.
The great number of people support and enjoy watching Wales rugby but when you have to pay £20-plus a month to Amazon for a year to watch half a dozen matches, I object.
I understand that the WRU achieved a concession it will be broadcast by Amazon in English and Welsh.
Of course, you still have to pay. However you can watch on S4C broadcast only in Welsh, after the match, a one-hour programme which contains adverts and prolonged discussion in Welsh.
Before people criticise me, my wife and I are pure Welsh but educated when WWII began, however our grandsons are educated totally in Welsh, which I support.
What worries me is that we have taken a decision to go down the route of independence which means if you cannot speak Welsh you will not get a job in Wales.
We are about to manage a global catastrophe and we cannot satisfy 80% of the Welsh people.
Malcolm Davies
Porth
Don’t get too smug about cheaper EVs
S4C runs a programme called Y Byd ar Bedwar similar to Question Time. In a recent programme, a smug electric vehicle owner was saying his car was cheaper to run than a conventional fossil fuel one.
The presenter and panel were slow to challenge his assertion.
Of course it’s cheaper now at the moment, but as EVs grow in numbers any and every government is going to slap some form of heavy tax upon them to replace the current £30bn a year UK motorists currently pay in fuel tax.
Then we will stop hearing smug claims of how cheap EVs are.
It seems inevitable that we will all get EVs and also inevitable we will all pay massively to run them one way or another.
Ioan Richard
Swansea
Mathematics, science and technology have never been so vital to our future as a species
Ian Roblin Llanishen, Cardiff
It’s not the country that’s being accused
IN ANSWER to the Prime Minister’s Glasgow speech... Dear Prime Minister, no one claimed that the UK was a corrupt country. It’s your parliamentary Conservative Party members who are accused of being patently and incontrovertibly corrupt.
Gareth W Thomas
Mayals, Swansea
Politicians should be a moral compass
IT IS up to voters to decide whether MPs with second jobs have “the right priorities”, Dominic Raab has said.
The work MPs do outside Westminster is under the spotlight, after ex-Tory MP Owen Paterson broke lobbying rules when working as a consultant.
Now MP Geoffrey Cox is facing questions about his work for a legal firm advising the British Virgin Islands. Labour’s Anneliese Dodds has written to the Prime Minister, asking about the Conservative MP’s second job.
The former Attorney General has earned hundreds of thousands of pounds working with an international law firm, where he was sent to advise the BVI over an inquiry into government corruption.
Boris Johnston is a few by-elections away from losing his job, the Tory knives are already being sharpened.
The PM should stand as a moral compass for the country, his party and fellow MPs from all parties beyond reproach, like the Church and Royal Family that preach to us with good moral values. So when the PM has no moral compass, then other MPs will start to follow suit.
What makes it hard to swallow is these politicians ditched the £20 Universal Credit uplift, with some having two or maybe three jobs. Andrew Nutt
Bargoed
I’m a wild animal... get me out of here!
WHILE other channels’ popular programming includes documentaries depicting the wonders of creatures big and small, ITV prepares to air the same cruel claptrap in its latest series of I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!
There’s a new line-up of celebs on the bill, but viewers can expect the usual cruel and tacky animal stunts we’ve seen year after year.
This blatant disregard for life sends the dangerous message that abusing animals is acceptable or even entertaining. But it isn’t funny to see shy snakes shrink away from
celebrities’ shrieks or cockroaches confined to an inescapable chamber with a flailing human. Treating animals like inanimate props for puerile pranks ignores all we’ve learned about the astonishing beings we share the world with.
An ever-closer look into the world of invertebrates reveals that they give back to the ecosystem they inhabit, communicate in complex ways, and live in harmony with other beings and the Earth – something we humans could learn from.
Please, change the channel on this circus until producers get animals out of there.
Jennifer White
Media and Communications Manager, PETA Foundation
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